How To Use Your Pizza Oven For Restaurant-Quality Frozen Pizza
Frozen pizzas are perfect for when you don't feel like preparing an entire dish from scratch, even if you've already got your own pizza oven. However, the problem is that some frozen pizzas taste like they were frozen, making you wish you could've dedicated more time to the process. However, letting the frozen pizza thaw in the fridge can be the secret to taking your frozen pizzas up a notch.
A pizza oven works by using extremely high heat to quickly and evenly cook a pizza. For a fresh pizza, this is fine because it's not so cold that it cooks unevenly. However, if you try to throw a frozen pizza in a pizza oven, either the outside will cook and the inside won't be heated all the way, or the inside will be hot and the outside will burn. Thawing the frozen pizza beforehand allows the pizza oven to cook it more evenly, resulting in restaurant-quality pizza with no extra ingredients.
It's essential to let the pizza thaw in the fridge rather than on the counter. Leaving perishable foods on the counter for even 20 minutes can lead to bacterial growth, which can cause foodborne illness. To achieve the best result without risking your or your family's health, it's best to be patient and avoid this frozen pizza mistake at all costs.
Best tips for making the most of a frozen pizza
While thawing before using a pizza oven is a great way to upgrade your frozen pizza, there are plenty of other ways to improve upon what you bought at the grocery store. One excellent option is to add some leftover deli meat to customize your pie. Frozen pizzas don't always have precisely what you want on them right out of the box, so why not take things into your own hands? Deli meat is a good way to add extra protein, and if it's already in your fridge, odds are you like it enough to crumble it over your frozen pie.
If deli meat isn't your style, there are still plenty of things you can add to a frozen pizza to make it more your own. From extra cheese to extra veggies, the possibilities are nearly endless, or as limitless as what you've got in the kitchen. You can even add things like eggs and bacon to turn a standard frozen pizza into a breakfast pizza, as long as you don't mind being full until lunchtime.
If you don't have a pizza oven, broiling your frozen pizza is perfect for achieving a similar effect. It'll cook at a much higher heat than the standard 400 degrees Fahrenheit they'll usually cook at. While not quite the 750 degrees that you can achieve with a pizza oven, it'll still cook faster than the time on the box and give you a crispier result.